Alabama
Highway 77 is a 124-mile stretch of road in eastern Alabama that runs from U.S.
Highway 431 near Lafayette through the Talladega National Forest, past the
entrance to the Talladega Super Speedway and ends at U.S. Highway 431 just
north of Attalla.

Just south
of Ashland on a perfectly straight stretch of Highway 77 sits Wellborn Cabinet
Inc. Paul Wellborn and Doug Wellborn founded the company in 1962 in Ashland. It
began as a small cabinet shop in a 3,200-square-foot building manufacturing
low-cost kitchen and bath cabinets. In 1986, according to the company's
website, Paul Wellborn purchased the company to become sole owner and changed
the marketing strategy to dealer/distributor sales.

The plant
has expanded since those early days to a 2,000,000 square foot facility which
supports a multimillion dollar business. Although during the past two years
there have been some 300 layoffs, the company still employs over 700
workers.It is the largest employer in
Clay County, home of Gov. Bob Riley.

Needless to
say, Gov. Riley has been a huge booster of the company in his home county. The
Wellborn family and the corporation, however, have returned the favor,
contributing over $25,000 to Riley's political causes.

Over $7,000
of those contributions were of the “in kind” nature for the use of the
corporation's airplanes. In 2007 The Independent reported that Riley's campaign
may have violated the state's Fair Campaign Practices Act by improperly listing
the $7,350 “in kind” contribution of Wellborn's company's King Air 350
Turboprop as a contribution of Wellborn, the individual.

Contributions
of over $500 by a corporation are illegal in a single election cycle. In 2007 the
company refused to tell us if Wellborn had reimbursed the company for Riley's
use of the plane, but a spokesman did state that the plane was owned by the
corporation. No investigation, if any was initiated, has yet been made public.

Riley's parting gift to Paul Wellborn

In 2007
Gov. Riley began pressuring the State Department of Transportation (ALDOT) to
facilitate Wellborn Cabinet's desire to relocate Highway 77 which would free up
additional acreage on the side of the highway where the company's manufacturing
plant is located. Wellborn would donate the right-of-way for the new roadway
and the state will give Wellborn the old right-of-way.

State
officials, other than ALDOT employees, who have spoken off-the-record, say
there is no need to re-route Highway 77, nor any state interest in doing so.
“We're putting a curve in a straight road, which amounts to making the road
more dangerous to the driving public,” one official familiar with the project
told The Independent.

The early
projected cost of the project was estimated by the State Department of
Transportation at $7.3 million and it will be funded entirely with state money.
The ALDOT won't finalize the construction estimate until the project is
authorized for bids, which, according to a department spokesperson Tony Harris
appears to be some time after January.

Funds for
construction of the project have not yet been authorized, and the project is
not scheduled in the December, 2010 or January, 2011 bid openings according to
Harris.

The project was
originally put in the DOT system for 2015, but suddenly moved to December for a
bid letting. The preliminary engineering and plan development started in 2007
and the state has already spent $410,000 on the project.

However,
The Independent has learned that there has been an unexpected delay in the
speed-up of the project. Sources in Clay County tell us utility firms there are
balking at the cost they must bear to move utility lines and pipes to
accommodate the re-route. And we are told that the state cannot pick up that
tab unless the utilities are paupers, a situation that doesn't seem to be
likely.

The
storyline on this project by the governor's folks is that the reason for the
Highway 77 re-route is that it would allow for the future expansion of one of
the county's largest employers.

If that
employer has plans to hire 500 more workers, that might be a valid reason, but
Wellborn Cabinets has laid off more than 300 workers in the past two years…some
just weeks ago.

Bob Martin
is editor and publisher of The Montgomery Independent. Email him at:
bob@montgomeryindependent.com